Northampton County Council should cut to the chase

Northampton County Councilman Scott Parsons, tired of extended legal wrangling by three lawyers, said he wanted to cut to the chase.

"We're talking about $84,000 for a publicist. Is this needed?"

Very good question. But it wasn't really the question at hand in this debate at Thursday night's County Council meeting.

Lamont McClure, the councilman who proposed the resolution that launched the discussion, said it was not designed to be an expression of council's opinion about the wisdom of County Executive John Brown's $84,000 contract with a public relations consultant, although McClure acknowledged that he thinks it's an "egregious waste" of the county's money. Because the contract was less than $100,000, it didn't require council's approval.

Rather, the issue was the process by which Brown selected and hired Sahl Communications, the same kind of noncompetitive negotiation that he employed in a four-year, $715,000-plus contract with a financial consultant — torpedoed by council's Finance Committee — and two smaller consultant contracts.

McClure, who is a lawyer, said Brown's approach is illegal under the county's administrative code, which council solicitor Phil Lauer advised requires competitive negotiations for professional services. County solicitor Victor Scomillio argued Brown's case that it was legal because it's not a professional service.

Much of the technical discussion was over whether a public relations firm provides a professional service. Scomillio also argued that contracts have been awarded under similar circumstances many times before, although it was unclear whether those instances really were akin to Brown's no-bid consultant frenzy.

Brown remained silent throughout the debate, perhaps wisely preferring to let his lawyer focus the discussion on the legal considerations.

The three lawyers rambled through a mind-numbing series of citations from past cases and lots of discussion about various sections of the administrative code that may or may not apply, mostly confusing the non-lawyers on council and in the audience. Hence Parsons' attempt to bring it to a less technical level.

Another requirement of the code, Lauer said, was for the contract to be preceded by an executive order explaining why it was being handled this way. That didn't happen until late Thursday afternoon, just before the meeting, and no one on council had seen what Scomillio called the "amended" executive order. Late in the meeting, he turned over his own copy, and Lauer's cursory review suggested it still wasn't as specific as required.

On the bright side for Republicans on council, clearly uncomfortable with slapping their fumbling fellow Republican Brown down for another misstep, this gave them an excuse to stall by proposing that the resolution be tabled until their next meeting, purportedly so they could review the amended executive order. This passed on a 5-4 party line vote.

But here are the problems that I hope Brown and everyone on council will consider before next week's meeting:

• If the executive order explanation was required before the contract was issued, Brown clearly violated the administrative code by providing it after the fact.

• If McClure is correct that this is a professional service and Brown proceeds with the contract, he risks a court challenge that he will lose. Even if he turns out to be technically within his rights, his appointment could be tied up in court for months.

Then again, even if council decides to approve McClure's resolution urging that the contract be repealed, that doesn't mean it will be willing to undertake that court challenge itself, assuming Brown chooses to ignore the recommendation. In fact, given the political makeup of council, I think it's unlikely. So if anyone sues, it probably will have to be a private citizen.

But let's cut to the chase, as Scott Parsons would say, and set aside the question of whether Sahl Communications provides what is legally considered a professional service and even whether John Brown needs $84,000 a year worth of public relations, work that typically has been performed by other governments in the Lehigh Valley and previously by Northampton County in-house in conjunction with other duties.

The real issue should be this:

Do we want the county executive to continue hiring expensive consultants — needed or not — without soliciting bids? Seeking Requests for Proposals, as customarily happens in these cases, would ensure that he knows who is willing to do this work and about how much it should cost. The RFP process allows him to weigh their proposals, choose the best fit and negotiate a rate with solid information instead of flying blind. That's responsible government.

So I hope that when County Council meets again next week, it will say with one voice that this is not how it wants the public's business to be done.

Better yet, I hope John Brown sees the light in the meantime and starts over again from the beginning. The right way.